


None the Wiser

by eriah211



Category: Whitechapel (TV)
Genre: Crime Fighting, Fluff and Angst, Insecurity, Light Angst, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Post-Season/Series Finale, Pre-Slash, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-21
Updated: 2017-01-21
Packaged: 2018-09-19 02:03:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9412922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eriah211/pseuds/eriah211
Summary: Set after series 4. Life just can't seem to be tidy and simple, no matter how much Chandler would love that.





	

**Author's Note:**

> First time Whitechapel fic, written for cordeliadelayne for the fandom stocking 2016. Thanks a lot for the beta to the lovely fififolle, any remainig mistakes are mine

 

Chandler had feared the doomsday _cult_ debacle was going to damage him more, but even though it had rocked his world, it hadn’t shattered it into little pieces like Morgan Lamb’s death had done what now felt like ages ago.  
  
Miles had been obviously worried about another breakdown too and had kept watch over him like a fretting mother hen, but he had eventually realised that it wasn’t going to be that bad and had relaxed slightly, although he still watched him closely more often than before.  
  
Chandler had kept counting and ordering the clips, pens and drawing pins, and tiger balm couldn’t be missing from his drawer, but he had managed to stop himself from changing his shirt more than once a day, twice, if things had been particularly bad, and that could be considered an improvement.  
  
He had focussed on the job and the facts and had ignored the superstitions and ghostly whispers that had almost made his team go crazy. You needed facts to solve crimes and maybe a bit of luck, but nothing else. Facts were safe and clear and they helped to keep the order in his life. 

After a while, Chandler had started to think that, as long as he kept himself busy and balanced, focussed on the job, nothing would hurt him that much anymore, but of course he had been wrong once again.  
  
That night they had been ready to arrest a band of smugglers that had ruthlessly killed two teenagers for no good reason. They had located them in a warehouse not far away from the port, but something had alerted the smugglers to their presence and soon they had been running after the suspects through a maze of piled up boxes inside the big building. Then somebody, accidentally or on purpose, had started a fire and the whole place had been in flames in a few minutes.  
  
Chandler tried to catch one of the men, but smoke was quickly starting to fill the place and he eventually had to admit defeat. He couldn’t see where the man was and it was getting difficult to breathe so he tried to find his team and get out of the building.  
  
Miles and Riley had been luckier and had managed to catch one of the smugglers. They were dragging the man outside the building with them when Chandler found them, but Mansell and Kent were still missing and the whole warehouse was already burning down.  
  
The firefighters arrived very fast, followed closely by some ambulances, and they immediately started working, trying to control the fire and stop it from spreading to other buildings.  
  
After a few minutes Chandler still hadn’t managed to find any more of his men and the familiar pressure of the anxiety, that he had thought he now had under control, was starting to grow inside his chest.  
  
Finally, he found Mansell, wrestling with a firefighter that was trying to drag the stubborn man  towards the paramedics.  
  
“Mansell!” Chandler shouted, getting closer. “Let these men do their jobs, they have to get you checked.”  
  
“I’m fine,” he grunted between coughs.  
  
“Miles and Riley are guarding a suspect. Have you seen Kent?” Chandler asked, anxiety starting to show in his voice.  
  
“Isn’t he with you outside?” Mansell replied, looking worried. “I got lost following one of those idiots, I don’t know where he went.”  
  
“I’m sure he is OK, I’ll keep looking for him, but you have to let them take a look at you,” Chandler said and started walking away.  
  
Mansell didn’t look very happy, but let himself be guided towards one of the ambulances.  
  
Chandler walked around the warehouse, calling Kent’s name as he frantically checked the faces of the people outside. He kept repeating to himself that Kent was surely OK, he had to, because any other option was unthinkable, but time passed and he still couldn’t find him.  
  
Miles joined him not long after and they kept searching together, but still they couldn’t find a trace of him.  
  
Then, on the other side of the building, where a small crowd of nosy people had started gathering, Chandler saw the paramedics and some police officers covering a body with a white sheet and he froze.  
  
Breathing was getting slightly difficult and panic was making his sight get blurry around the edges, but he tried to look calm as they got closer.  
  
“This poor guy couldn’t get out and jumped through one of the windows on the first floor,” one of the officers explained when they got there.  
  
“Any identification?” Miles asked automatically. “One of our men is missing.”  
  
“The man is half-burnt and still smoking, we haven’t checked yet.”  
  
The smell was nauseating, but Chandler crouched to lift up the sheet and take a look.  He shouldn’t have. There was no face to recognize anymore and most of his clothes had burnt. Still, there was enough left to see the remains of some blue jeans and black sneakers. They looked like the ones Kent had been wearing.  
  
Oh, god, please, not Kent, was all Chandler could think as he fought to control his breathing.  
  
The more he watched the badly-burnt body, the more it resembled Kent. Size was about the same and could that be a lock of dark hair on the blackened head?  
  
Chandler let the sheet fall over the body as he staggered away, blurry edges on his sight getting brighter and a ringing noise in his ears that muffled all the other sounds. He felt a strong grip on his arm and saw Miles' worried face looking at him. He was telling him something, but it was difficult to hear anything aside from the noise inside his head.  
  
Miles made him turn around unceremoniously and dragged him away from the body. He was probably trying to save him the embarrassment of breaking down in tears in front of everybody, Chandler thought, but then Miles smacked him really hard in the arm and pointed to an ambulance that was a few metres away. Kent was sitting on the back, wearing an oxygen mask and looking very dirty, but very much alive.  
  
Chandler finally could take a deep breath and then another one, and the ringing noise started to fade away.  
  
“Stop being a drama queen, the boy’s OK!” Miles was chastising him.  
  
Kent soon noticed them getting closer and immediately got rid of the mask to walk towards them with relief written all over his soot-stained face.

Chandler quickened his pace and when he reached Kent, he did something very unprofessional. He hugged him tightly, as if he was worried the young man would disappear if he let go.  
  
A warm sense of calm started washing over him then and finally the blurry edges disappeared completely.  
  
  


***

They said Kent seemed to be OK, but they wanted to make a more thorough check to be sure so they took him to the hospital in the ambulance. While Riley and Mansell stayed behind until to see the last details being sorted out, Miles drove Chandler to the hospital in his car.  
  
When they arrived, Miles turned to look seriously at him before they got out of the car and Chandler had the certainty that he was about to be lectured.  
  
“It’s time we have a talk,” Miles said.  
  
Chandler groaned and massaged his temples, trying to hide his embarrassment. Hugging a subordinate in public like that had probably bothered even Miles, who was usually a very easy-going man.  
  
“I know it wasn’t professional to hug a subordinate-” Chandler tried to explain.  
  
“Nobody gives a damn about that!” Miles interrupted him, irritated. “I’d have hugged him too, but you had wrapped yourself around him and you didn’t let go!”  
  
Chandler stared at him both in shock and embarrassment.  
  
“I want to talk about you and Kent,” Miles added, looking pointedly at him. “And I hate chitchatting so let’s cut to the chase: you like Kent.”  
  
“What? Who-? I told you I’m not gay!” Chandler replied, bewildered.  
  
“Gay, bi, open-minded,... whatever you call it these days, I don’t care,” Miles replied stubbornly. “The fact is that even a blind man would have seen by now that Kent likes you and I think you had made it very clear today that you feel something for him too.”  
  
Chandler stuttered, trying to give a sensible reply to that.  
  
“He’s a grown-up, no matter how young he looks, and you’re a grown-up too,” Miles added without giving him a chance to talk. “So stop being a coward and do something about it!”  
  
“I’m his superior and-” Chandler tried to say.  
  
“That’s bullshit and you know it! It wouldn’t be the first office affair and it won’t be the last!” Miles interrupted him again. “You don’t want to try because you just feel safer if you are alone!”  
  
Chandler couldn’t get himself to deny that last statement. He knew it was true, it had always been better if he was alone. Easier.  
  
They stared at each other in silence for a while, until Miles finally took a deep breath and kept talking more calmly.  
  
“Look, Joe, Kent already knows you and all your peculiarities and you haven’t scared him away. You don’t want to regret not having given it a try just because it might not be easy. We already have enough regrets on the job, don’t add another one,” he said, seriously.  “Be honest with yourself and with the boy, and don’t waste a chance to be happy, if you feel it could work.”  
  
He had never given it serious thought, Chandler admitted to himself. He had, as he usually did, ignored any signs of Kent’s affection towards him, hoping they would disappear eventually, and had focussed on his job and his organized life. But the painful feeling of loss that had hit him when he had thought Kent had died had showed him that he cared deeply about him, way more than he had realised.  
  
“Now let’s go inside,” Miles said, after another deep sigh. “And you better have a talk with Kent soon, before I get tired of all this sappy nonsense and decide to kick your arse.”  
  
When they got out of the car, Chandler took a deep breath and straightened his tie and suit, avoiding Miles' gaze.  
  
“Just remember to be honest and don’t play games with the boy or Riley’ll bite your head off, superior officer or not,” Miles advised him as they walked into the hospital.  
  
Chandler didn’t doubt it for a moment.  
  


***

They found Kent on a stretcher in an empty room, still waiting for the tests to be done and after a minute or two, Miles made up a weak excuse and left them alone.  
  
Chandler stared at Kent as he fidgeted nervously with his fingers while looking around the room. He didn’t know exactly what to say.  
  
“You are feeling well, then?” Chandler asked when it was clear the silence had gone on for too long.  
  
“Yes, yes, it’s just that...” Kent faltered, looking slightly embarrassed. “I’m not fond of hospitals after the Kays incident.”  
  
Chandler grimaced. The Kays case had been a complete mess and he still couldn’t remember it without feeling ashamed. Kent had got hurt and Chandler had hurt him even more by not trusting him.  
  
Chandler cleared his throat, staring at his own hands, still not sure what to say. He noticed then the black stains on the cuffs of his white shirt and frowned. He saw many others all over his suit. He tried to brush some of them off, but he only managed to spread them around.  
  
“I've covered you with soot,” Kent said, noticing. “Sorry, sir.”  
  
Chandler had been so relieved to see him alive that he hadn’t been bothered by the soot covering the young DC when he had hugged him. Now, though, it was a different matter.  
  
“You don’t have to stay, Miles can take me home when everything is done,” Kent added sheepishly. “You’d probably like to go home and change now.”  
  
The dirt over his clothes was starting to unnerve him and made him ache for a clean, neatly ironed shirt and suit. The room around him now looked too untidy, not so clean, and his hand, that had been grabbing the rail of the stretcher, twitched involuntarily away when he thought about how many nurses, doctors and patients could have been touching it in the last hours. He scratched the back of his hand nervously, trying to keep those thoughts out of his mind, but he didn’t know how long he was going to be able to stay there wearing a dirty outfit.  
  
“Really, sir, it’s OK,” Kent insisted, his eyes kind and understanding.  
  
Chandler looked at him and decided to try something. He smiled at Kent and slowly took the young man’s dirty hand with his.  
  
Kent looked surprised for a moment, but he immediately smiled back at him and squeezed his hand lightly.  
  
The ache slowly disappeared, dirt and disorder losing the grip they had over him. Holding Kent’s hand while the young man looked kindly at him made him feel calm. It made him feel that everything could be fine.  
  
Something caught Kent’s attention and when Chandler followed his gaze, he saw Riley and Mansell at the doorway, staring at them. Riley smiled broadly and Mansell, always so subtle, grinned at Kent and showed two thumbs-ups in approval.Kent groaned, looking mortified, and Chandler quickly let go of his hand, blushing lightly.  
  
“We just wanted to make sure that you were OK,” Riley said as she elbowed Mansell in the belly quite hard. “But I see you are doing fine and I really have to go back to my children so we’ll be going now.”  
  
“But it’s still early and we’ve just arrived!” Mansell complained.  
  
“It’s not early and you have to drive me home, remember?” Riley added looking pointedly at him.  
  
“Oh, right, yes,” he replied, finally catching up. “Get well soon, mate!” he added as a goodbye, winking.  
  
Chandler chuckled softly as he watched them walk away. He had quite a team. Subtlety wasn’t one of their virtues, but they were all good people.  
  
“I was thinking...” Chandler finally said, looking back at Kent. “Would you want to go out for a drink later, if this doesn’t take too long? Or maybe tomorrow?”  
  
“I would love to,” Kent said, smiling brightly at him.  
  
They would start with that, Chandler thought, and they would see where it led them.  
  
  
-END-


End file.
